The wild cat of the Iberian Peninsula, in danger of extinction?

Irene Vega

The recent Red List Evaluation for the European wildcat (Happy New Year), promoted by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), shows an alarming scenario for this small cat in the Iberian Peninsula, showing a great fragmentation of its populations in Spain and Portugal. In addition, this study reveals serious knowledge gaps, particularly regarding its abundance and trends.

Moved by this situation, a group of more than 30 Iberian specialists in this small cat held a technical meeting at the beginning of 2022 with the main objective of collecting updated information on the situation of the species and establishing a roadmap to help reverse this situation. situation. The different groups that work with the species shared for the first time the information available for different regions of Spain and Portugal, reaching the main conclusion that there are two different and contrasting situations of the species in the Iberian Peninsula. In the north and northeast, the species is apparently well distributed with relatively high densities. However, in the south and center of the peninsula there is low occupancy with extreme fragmentation and low density.

The team of experts, including Emilio Virgós, a researcher in the area of ​​Biodiversity and Conservation at the Rey Juan Carlos University, points out that urgent actions are required to clarify the causes of this widespread decline and design the necessary conservation measures. particularly in the Mediterranean subpopulation. "The priority actions would be to compile all available information on status and trends, agree on standardized and unified monitoring methods that allow periodic assessments of populations, assess the possibility of a regional assessment of conservation status, and raise awareness among the public and administrations of the scenario of pre-extinction that the species faces in most of Iberia”, say the experts. Currently, and under the coordination of Emilio Virgós and José María Gil-Sánchez, a national census of the species is being carried out with the collaboration of dozens of volunteers. The census, carried out with photo-trapping cameras, will end this summer and will have covered more than 120 points (of 2000 hectares each) distributed throughout the Spanish geography. This census can be a first good quantitative diagnosis of the current situation in our country.

In addition to these conclusions, the team of experts has marked out some essential steps that must be followed for the preservation of the species: setting up specific working groups on different conservation problems and evaluating their status at the regional level with the IUCN, as well as initiating a awareness campaign aimed at the public and those responsible for the administrations on the situation of the species. In this sense, on April 27, a first meeting will be held with different officials from the Ministry of Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenge to begin coordinating some of the actions necessary to reverse the situation of the species.

The group of Iberian specialists is coordinated by the URJC researcher Emilio Virgós together with Pablo Ferreras (Institute for Research in Hunting Resources, IREC-CSIC), José María Gil-Sánchez (Department of Zoology, University of Granada) and Pedro Monterroso ( CIBIO/InBIO, Center for Research in Biodiversity and Genetic Resources and BIOPOLIS, University of Porto, Portugal).